


What's In a Name?

by sue_denimme



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-30
Updated: 2012-01-30
Packaged: 2017-10-30 08:25:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/329769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sue_denimme/pseuds/sue_denimme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Donna asks the Doctor a question he can't answer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What's In a Name?

Out of all the possible questions in all the universe, from the beginning of time to its end, he really ought to have known that _this_ would be the one she would choose to ask. But no, he'd just _had_ to agree to that stupid bet about the color of George Washington's hair (under the wig). For a genius, he really wasn't very smart sometimes, not that he would ever admit that out loud.

"You _said_ that if I won, I could ask you one question, and you would answer it."

No, she wasn't backing down, not even under the full force of his patented Oncoming-Storm, I'm-the-last-Time-Lord-and-your-arse-is-toast glare. This was a face that could glare just as effectively as it could grin, but not this time. Of course not.

Martha would have backed down, he was sure. Even Rose might have done. But this was Donna, and she had never let him weasel out of anything. He even loved her for it, too -- sometimes.

"I know what I said," he growled, yanking the hand brake a bit more forcefully than was really called for, and watching as the time rotor began its rise and fall.

Donna crossed her arms over her chest and gave him a pretty good glare of her own. "So answer it, then."

The Doctor leaned on the console and let out an exasperated breath while glancing at the domed ceiling of the console room. He stayed silent.

"Oh, come off it," she said impatiently, rolling her eyes. "It's not like I asked you your bank PIN, or boxers or briefs, or something. I can't believe you're getting all weird and huffy and Martian-y on me just because I asked what your real bloody name is!"

"Donna -- " He stopped himself, and took a moment to recite happy primes in his head so he could calm down enough to speak to her rationally. After all, it wasn't as if she had any idea where she was treading. "Look, I'm sorry, but that particular question is off limits. Not because I don't want to tell you. It's because I _can't_ , do you understand? Ask something else. Anything. Please."

"Why can't you?" Her eyes widened suddenly, and she smirked. "It's not anything embarrassing, is it? Like the Time Lord equivalent of Irving, or Regis, or Jingleheimer? How about Percy? Winthrop? Milhouse?"

She was winding him up now, and he knew it, but he couldn't stop himself. "No, of course not, don't be daft."

"Well, then, is it because nobody's called you it in so long that you've forgotten what it was?"

"No, I remember it just fine, and it's a perfectly acceptable name, and before you ask, no, it does _not_ sound like anything silly in your language, much though I hate to disappoint you."

"Then why won't you tell me? You don't expect me to believe your parents named you 'The Doctor', do you? Wait a minute, do you even _have_ parents?"

He tried not to grit his teeth. "Yes, of course I have parents. _Had_ parents. What did you think, I was grown in a petri dish? Or woven on a loom?" He grimaced. How _had_ that whole "loom" story got started, anyway?

"Well, _I_ don't know! You swan about the universe acting like some almighty enigma, you never say anything about yourself except little dribs and drabs when you absolutely have to, and you get snippy when I want to know more?" Donna sighed, and her expression softened, just an atom. "Listen -- Doctor, I've trusted you with my life, since I first met you, and -- "

The Doctor lifted an eyebrow at her. Very eloquent eyebrows, this incarnation had. He should know, he'd practiced.

She smiled. "All right, all right. _Almost_ since I first met you. The point is, I thought maybe you might have figured out by now that _you_ can trust _me_ just as much." She laid her hand on his arm.

Oh, this really wasn't fair. He groaned and closed his eyes, but reached up and squeezed her hand briefly. "I do trust you, Donna. With more than my life. You know that. But this isn't about trust. What you're asking from me, it's -- it's just not that simple."

"I'm clever, and I'm listening." (He blinked -- he'd heard, or seen, those exact words somewhere before, said by someone else, but that wasn't exactly relevant at the moment, was it?) "And I know how much you love explaining things. So explain it to me."

The Doctor didn't answer immediately, but turned and went to the "captain's chair", sitting down with elbows on his knees and his head bent so that he could run his hands through his hair. This was absolutely a hands-through-hair moment. Finally he looked up at her. She had settled against the console, watching him with arms folded.

"What does your name mean?" he asked her softly. Then abruptly held up a hand to stop her from answering. "I know, 'Donna' means 'lady' and 'Noble' means 'noble', but what I mean is, what does it _mean_? To you, that is?"

Donna shrugged. "I dunno. I guess I never really thought about it. It just means -- me. It's who my parents decided I was when I was born, and I've been that ever since."

He nodded. "A label. One your parents gave you. They told you you were Donna, and so you became Donna. What Donna meant changed as you changed over the years, and the Donna that you are is different to any other Donna in existence."

"I suppose..."

"Well, my people used to look at names a bit differently. We were telepathic, you see."

"Yeah. And?"

"Imagine living in a telepathic society, Donna, and being telepathic yourself. We weren't the greatest telepaths in the universe, mind -- you've seen me, I can pick up the odd random brainwave, or strong emanations such as the Ood song, but to really communicate mind-to-mind, I have to touch people in a certain manner and concentrate. And as I am now, I'm probably the most powerful I've ever been. I've certainly used it more often in the last few years than I'd ever done previously." Realizing he was in danger of heading off on a tangent, he coughed. " _Any_ way, in a society where everyone can read everyone else's minds, privacy becomes paramount. So we learned to create mental shields, and we had telepathic dampening devices, and as a last defense, we had our names."

Donna knitted her brows together. "Your names?"

"Yes. Labels, but more than that. Actually, Gallifreyans all had at least two names. A social name, for the world to know us by, and a 'real' name, that only one's parents and one's psychically bonded mate would ever know. Those of us who became Time Lords also often changed the social name to something else -- usually actually more like a title that we adopted and used as a name. Such as, well, The Doctor."

"Okay...So how is a name a defense?"

The Doctor steepled his hands. "My name is -- well, it's like a box, a little box inside my head. It's also the contents of that box, and the key to it as well. Inside that box is everything I am, everything unique to me, everything I mean to myself, everything that I keep separate from the universe at large. I have to keep it separate, or I will literally go mad. _Don't_ say it." He grinned and brandished a finger at her, anticipating her retort. "For better or worse, Donna, I've made myself the universe's protector. Which makes my name a very dangerous thing for anyone else to know. In the wrong hands, it could do a lot of damage, not only to me, but to the universe, indirectly. _That's_ why I can't tell it to you. It's not that I don't trust you. But someone else could take it from you, especially since you're not telepathic and don't have shields. I can't risk it. Do you understand?"

She was peering at him, narrow-eyed. "There is absolutely no way that even you can possibly not know how egotistical you sound. Which, I guess, means you're probably telling the truth."

"Thanks, I think," he said wryly, but he had to smile again. She just couldn't resist bringing him down a peg, could she? And yes, he did love her for that, too, in a strange sort of way.

He got up and began to circle the console, checking to see if they were on course, keeping an eye on the thermal buffer, wondering when he'd last replaced the Zeiton crystals. Busywork, really. At least the conversation was over.

No, it wasn't. Donna was following him.

"So what you're telling me is that in order to find out your real name, I have to become your -- what did you call it? -- psychic mate or whatever?"

The Doctor gave her his best roguish grin. "Why? You offering, Sunshine?" he asked, quoting back to her the sarcastic endearment she'd addressed him with when she had bullied herself back into his life, not that long ago.

"No! I was being, you know, hypothetical. You're still a long streak of nothing, as far as I'm concerned." She sniffed.

"Good." He winked, and clicked his tongue for good measure, and she rolled her eyes at him, but then she rather spoiled the effect by smiling back.

"So, Space Man," she asked. "Boxers or briefs?"

 

~end


End file.
